Farewell to a giant of African jazz

The Mercury’s Gig Guide columnist and the owner of one of South Africa’s oldest jazz venues, Pinetown’s Rainbow Restaurant, pays homage to a friend and jazz legend.

TODAY I write about the passing of a dear friend and a giant of South African jazz, Patrick Vuyo Matshikiza, who died last week, aged 76, at his home in Queenstown in the Eastern Cape.

This is not the first time I have written about a great musician who has influenced my career in music production.

As with the likes of Doc Mthalane, Sipho Gumede, Sandile Shange, Busi Mhlongo and Syd Kitchen, one is confronted with the sad reality of how poorly the lives of our musical legends are documented, with massive gaps in what is recorded, and numerous conflicting facts.

So one is left to rely on personal experiences, with help from sources such as sleeve notes from one of the artist’s album releases – in this case Seasons, Masks and Keys penned by Sandile Dikeni; and Gwen Ansell’s Soweto Blues: Jazz, Popular Music & Politics in South Africa.

Matshikiza was born on November 10, 1938, into a musical household – his father being vaudevillian pianist and bandleader Meekley “Fingertips” Matshikiza –in the township of New Brighton (Mlungisi) in Komani, near Queenstown, in the Eastern Cape.

It is a community that has contributed greatly to the identity of South African jazz, having produced Matshikiza’s uncle Todd Matshikiza, Margaret Mcingana, Stompie Mavi, Don Tshobela and Zim Ngqawana.

I first heard Matshikiza’s name during my musical education at Busi Mhlongo’s home in Grace Avenue, Westville, in the early 1990s. There, musicians such as Gumede, Bheki Mseleku, Mthalane, Shange, Mshaks Gasa and Madala Kunene would gather on an almost daily basis.

The impression I got was that Matshikiza was a bit of a rascal; and much-revered for his extensive contribution to South African jazz from the early 1960s, when he relocated to Joburg.

His first port of call was Dorkay House, where he was welcomed into Mackay Davashe’s Jazz Dazzlers ,with Davashe on tenor sax, Kippie Moeketsie on alto sax, Makhaya Ntshoko on drums, Saint Mokoangoe on bass, Denis Mpale on trumpet, Blyth Mbityana on trombone and Matshikiza on piano.

On vocals were Letta Mbuli, Thandi Klaasen, Ben “Satch” Masinga, the Woody Woodpeckers including Victor Ndlazilwana, and an array of back-up singers featuring, among others, Abigail Khubeka.

Dikeni’notes: “The silent insistence in Mackay Davashe’s band was simply skill and talent. And while there, although he did not play his own compositions, Matshikiza learnt the art of listening to the urban landscape with its many sounds, and found a strange canvas in his own soul and mind, where he could musically paint his own muse.”

Dikeni goes on to note that armed with “tunes from God”, Matshikiza, started attending sessions at Dorkay House, where he jammed with the likes of Chris McGregor and others who later left for exile.

It was in fact McGregor who, during these jam sessions, pointed out to Matshikiza the singularity of his style on piano.

Matshikiza went on to enter jazz competitions and won prizes that sometimes lured him overseas, but he preferred to play in South Africa.

He ended up playing in hotels and such places, and gigs that hardly denoted the maestro in him. At best he became an evasive legend whose musical voice spoke louder than his persona in the annals of the South African jazz discography. Jazz great Patrick Vuyo Matshikiza, whose funeral will be held at 9am on Saturday at the Indoor Sports Centre in Komani, near Queenstown in the Eastern Cape. The singer, pianist and composer died at his Queenstown home last week. He was 76.

In 1975, the four-track album, Tshona!, with compositions by Matshikiza and Moeketsi, was released by Rashid Vally’s The Sun label.

Contributors to the title track, composed by Matshikiza and which remains one of the most identifiable tracks in our collective consciousness, included Basil ( Mannenberg) Coetzee on tenor sax, Alex Khaoli on bass, Sipho Mabuse on drums and Dennis Phillips on alto sax, alongside Moeketsi.

This track became an anthem of the anti-apartheid movement. It was a defiant shout out against the injustices of the system.

By the late 1990s, Matshikiza was nearing the end of two decades of playing cocktail music in hotels.

For more on this period of his life I refer to Ansell’s book, but the closing line of Matshikiza’s remarks on this time is quite telling: “Twenty years playing in hotels, and all that time I was either a prisoner or pet”.

After his final residency playing in the foyer of the Hilton, Durban, Matshikiza relocated to Joburg for a few years. where Mzi Khumalo’s Metallon Group, on the Catwalk Records label, commissioned pianist Themba Mkhize to produce the album Seasons, Masks and Keys.

By this stage, Matshikiza was already showing signs of the onset of Parkinson’s Disease, and after its release in 2005, he returned to settle in Durban with his second wife, Philile.

Rainbow Restaurant founder Ben Pretorius then asked me to assist in looking after Pat, the man in a hat.

We managed to get a few gigs together for him but the progressive degeneration of Parkinson’s made it increasingly hard for him to perform.

The last major performance Matshikiza undertook was with a quintet at the 2008 Standard Bank Joy of Jazz Festival in Newtown, Joburg.

For a couple of years, when in Durban to perform at the Rainbow, he would sleep over at Summerhill Guest Lodge, where all suites are named after famous local musicians that have stayed there, Matshikiza included.

Eventually, even weekly sessions on the baby grand became too much for him.

In 2011, when he could no longer support the studies of his son Lungisani, whom he had out of wedlock with Thabisile Mchunu, he asked for assistance.

Lungisani came to work at the Rainbow, and so I have remained close to the story.

Towards the end of 2011, Matshikiza was in hospital for a couple of months after a stroke.

It was not many months ago that Philile and Pat moved into a house in CC section in Umlazi, compliments of Ethekwini Municipality, after his dire circumstances received spme much-needed media attention.

An ad company in Joburg even donated an electric wheelchair but he was already too frail to benefit much from it.

In late November, Philile was informed that she needed to have a heart transplant, urgently.

Sadly, she passed away on December 14.

On Boxing Day, Pat’s daughter, Ncabakazi, a nurse, and son, Thabo Matshikiza, from his first marriage to the late Nosipho Kuse, took him home to Komani.

He passed away on Monday, December 29.

Goodbye Mr Matshikiza. They may have called you a rascal but to me you were a gentleman of the highest order.

The funeral service for Patrick Vuyo Matshikiza will be held from 9am on Saturday at the Indoor Sports Centre in Komani, near Queenstown, and the burial will be at the Queenstown Cemetery.

Those wishing to attend the funeral, or who might want to send flowers or a donation, should get further information from Ncabakazi Matshikiza at 076 430 8601.